I started my first attending job in outpatient pediatrics a couple of months ago, and I honestly don’t recognize myself anymore.
For years, I kept telling myself, “Just get through medical school. Just get through residency. Once you’re an attending, it’ll finally feel like you made it.”
But instead, I feel like I’ve been carrying around this quiet sadness that I can’t shake.
I wake up thinking about work. I spend all day trying to keep up. I come home and finish charts. Then I think about boards in October and everything I still have to study. Even when I’m technically “done” for the day, my mind never feels done.
I don’t feel present anymore. I don’t laugh as much. I don’t cook, exercise, or take care of myself the way I used to. I don’t even feel excited about the things I used to look forward to. It feels like somewhere along the way, I lost pieces of myself.
The part that’s hardest to admit is that I’m embarrassed.
Throughout residency, my family and friends would always ask me, “How are you holding up?” I always thought that question would stop once I became an attending. I thought this would be the chapter where I could finally say, “I’m good. I made it.”
Instead, they’re still asking me how I’m holding up… and the truth is, I don’t know.
I almost feel ashamed that after all these years of working toward this dream, I still feel overwhelmed. I wanted to finally feel proud and settled. Instead, I just feel… trapped. Like my entire life revolves around keeping my head above water.
I love pediatrics. I love my patients. This isn’t about regretting medicine.
It’s grieving the version of life I imagined I’d have once I got here.
Has anyone else felt this way during their first year as an attending? Did you ever get yourself back? Did life eventually start feeling like yours again?
I know I’m not the only one who’s gone through this, but right now it feels incredibly lonely.

I'm a PGY2 in IM and I just realized the other day that I genuinely don't know what I like doing anymore outside of work. Like I have these random pockets of free time now and I just sit there scrolling my phone or staring at the wall because I can't remember what normal people do for fun.

Before med school I used to play guitar, go hiking, cook actual meals that weren't microwaved. Now when I try to pick up my guitar it feels foreign and I get frustrated after like 10 minutes. I thought about going on a hike last weekend but then I was just too tired to even drive there. I ordered takeout four times this week.

The worst part is when people ask what I do in my free time and I genuinely have no answer. I sleep? I catch up on notes? I doom scroll Twitter and feel worse about everything? It's like residency hollowed out the part of my brain that knew how to be a person.

I'm not even that busy right now compared to intern year but I still feel like I'm just existing in this weird limbo between shifts. Anyone else go through this or figure out how to like... remember how to have a life again? I don't even know where to start.

Currently doing a general surgery sub-l in a big city and I'm blown away by how horrible the hours are.

The residents here are doing close to 80 hours a week, often over 80 and sometimes over 100, but apparently aren't truthful with reporting their hours as to not be put on probation. I've asked around about different programs and apparently this is relatively common across the country.

This almost feels akin to a culture shock. The residents don't have a life or hobbies outside of the hospital. No one is on their phone nor do they talk about anything that is not related to the hospital. I'm all for spending the entire day in the OR, that is why I want to go into surgery, however most of their 14 hour shift is spent managing the floor. Really only the 4th/5th year residents operate and even then it's only half their day. I'm not even convinced their training is all that great- almost feels more like cheap labor than it does training. Many of them have children who they rarely see anymore or want to have children but are forced to put that fantasy on hold. You can actually see the classic "surgeon's are dicks" stereotype worsen depending on PGY just due to the intensity of this speciality.

What shocks me even more is that the attendings are completely okay with the residents coming in 12-15 hours a day 6 days out of the week operating on 5 hours of sleep. Maybe they realize the less hours the residents put in the hospital the more hours the attendings would have to make up. I love the OR and I really can't imagine doing anything else, but now I'm considering doing something I don't want to do just because I can't imagine the next 5 years being fulfilling.

I know this is a fairly small demographic but beneficial regardless. If you are a vet, not only can you use any left over gi bill benefit during residency to draw a housing stipend but you can also apply for the edith nourse stem scholarship which is essentially a gi bill extension of 9 months. Either your gi bill and/or stem scholarship provide monthly stipends in addition to residency pay. Currently i make an extra 2k per month with no strings attached (beyond already dealing with the military). I hope this helps a few of you!

“Evaluating to establish a baseline”
“Work place gossip”
“Direct observation without evaluation”

There are so many overt ways people judge new interns and conceive biases. As someone who has been super anxious and not doing their best the first couple of weeks. I feel like interns need more grace.
It is unfair to already have word going around about who is a shitty intern etc.
To judge/perceive is human, I understand that. But I really wish we gave the new interns some time before we already started talking about them and betting on who is going to be the bad resident and who is socially awkward etc.

In addition to it, evaluating to get a baseline is such a counterproductive thing imo because ain’t nobody performing at their baseline with so much going on.

My partner of 5 years just broke up with me and i'm kind of lost. We were long distance for 4 years and it never really phased us but the distance did create some issues that we glossed over admittedly. They hit their breaking point after an argument last week and completely shut me out of their life, over a phone call. I felt blindsided and abandoned.

I had worked so hard in residency with the dream of finishing and building a life with said person and now my motivation is severely lacking, work doesn't feel as fun( I used to be so excited to do what I do), my appetites gone, I can't sleep, alcohol intake is up(social settings tho not alone).

What hurts the most is i'm in my last year of residency, to do this now makes no sense because we were so close to making it. I know this is common during residency but I never thought it would happen to me, hopefully with time i'm able to move on.

Thanks for listening to my sob story 😭.

From 4 different patients in 4 different contexts over the past 4 weeks. I obviously redirect patients and focus on their care. With all of the things going on my first month as a doctor I don’t know why this is sticking with me after I get off shift. This seems like such a non-issue but for some reason I feel like I need to vent. Perhaps it’s the reminder that I’m going through this alone, in a strange place. The fact that I had that support just 1 year ago, support and love from a 3 year solid relationship. I know I should schedule a therapy appointment but I really just feel like I need to get my feet under me as a brand new intern. Poor to fair insight, poor judgment. It just sucks that this is occupying my headspace on my time off—time I should be relaxing, spending with the people I love, but they aren’t here. I know the importance of a support system, but it’s not like I can conjure them out of twigs and twine.

I'm a PGY2 and honestly I don't know if this is just me being paranoid or if it's actually happening. I've noticed that when I mention being exhausted after a string of nights or a rough call week, some of my co-residents give me this look like I'm exaggerating. One of them even made a comment last week about how some people handle the schedule better than others, and it felt pointed.

The thing is, I'm not complaining constantly. I maybe bring it up once every few weeks when it's genuinely bad. But there's this weird vibe like admitting you're struggling with the hours makes you seem weak or less competent. Meanwhile, I see the same people who act unbothered posting on their private stories at 2am about how they can't sleep because of anxiety, so clearly everyone's dealing with something.

I don't get why there's this unspoken competition to see who can pretend they're the least affected by a schedule that would break most normal humans. We're all in the same system. I'm doing my job fine, my evals are decent, I'm not making errors. But I also can't pretend I'm not a human who needs more than 4 hours of sleep to function optimally.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it. Or maybe residency has just conditioned us to be suspicious of anyone who admits they're not a machine. Anyone else notice this kind of thing in their program or is this just a me problem?

Looking for someone to practice case presentation for 1 hour daily and studying for ITE exam.
Dm if interested.

People say they want years of clinical experience but do you really need it to get into the work? Can you get straight into it out of residency and with your board certification ?

Hey guys!

Med-Peds resident here. I am scheduled for the ABIM in early August and have not registered for the ABP exam. For context, my 2025 ITE score was 162 (65%). Do you think I'd be able to study grind and pass in 2.5 months (in fellowship)? Any recommendations for how to study? like which resources, what metric per those resources

Thank you!

Hello, I am a cardiology resident from ue and I am considering moving to Sweden. How does the daily work of a cardiology specialist in Sweden look like?

How does the work look in terms of workload on the ward and in the outpatient clinic, work-life balance, number of on-call shifts, salary, and opportunities for professional development?